WHAT'S particularly poor about a church mouse, of course, is that whilst such places may offer abundant nourishment for the soul, there is precious little for the body - and not even the ASTMS (clerical section) to fight for improved conditions and time and a half on Sundays.

The Oxford Dictionary offers references to the hardships suffered by ecclesiastical rodents as far back as 1731, Thackeray lamented their lot in Vanity Fair, Sir John Betjeman wrote a wonderful Church Mouse poem.

Here among long discarded cassocks

Damp stools and half-split open hassocks,

Here where the Vicar never looks

I nibble through old service books.

All that the unfortunate little things have to look forward to is harvest festival, as Betjeman memorably observed...

Christmas and Easter may be feasts

For congregations and for priests,

And so may Whitsun. All the same,

They do not fill my meagre frame.

For me the only feast of all

Is autumn's Harvest Festival,

Where I can satisfy my want

With ears of corn around the font.

It was an appropriate time of year, therefore, to visit the Church Mouse pub and restaurant at Chester Moor, on the A167 between Durham and Chester-le-Street and until recently a Wacky Warehouse.

Children, a sign said, continued to be welcome if accompanied by well behaved parents. On this occasion our old friend Mr Brian Mulligan was gathered in also.

It's now a Vintage Inn, named like almost all the genre after an animal. The exception is the Old Farmhouse, between Darlington and Teesside Airport, but since that's closing next month for major refurbishment it will probably re-emerge as the Rubber Duck, or something.

The decor is by now familiar: stone floors, log baskets by fireplaces which will never blaze, old prints of Walter Willson stores - expect them shortly to be re-branded as Walt's - and of someone who looked like Mr Leon Brittan but may have been an urban district council sanitary inspector, circa 1920.

There are also, yet more fashionable, little boards offering the aphorisms of the wise - Tennyson, Shelley and Mr Oscar Wilde's immortal observation that experience is the name which everyone gives to their mistakes.

Behind the olde worlde facade, however, beats a highly sophisticated heart and a till that appears to be computer linked to the kitchen, to headquarters and probably to the International Monetary Fund as well.

Try, for example, ordering sea bass. "With or without the head on?" asked the assistant. Mr Mulligan confirmed that he would prefer his basso profundo - that is to say, intact.

For sea bass with the head on, you press the "Hold" button on the till. Decapitated is clearly different, and must not be confused with decaffeinated. Sometimes in these places we wonder if the food itself is not electronically transmitted; it can only be a matter of time.

Since Mully is also a cigar man, we settled in the smokers' den of a vast eating area, studied a far-ranging menu and ordered, as customers must, at the appointed area of the bar. The long spoon which identified our place carried the number 137; that's an awful lot of covers.

The table being commendably spacious, Mully - whose football allegiance is to Brandon United - proceeded to demonstrate with the condiments and cutlery some of the tactical pitfalls from the precious week's FA Cup tie. By every account, the salt and pepper pots played rather better than Brandon's forward line did.

We began with the pheasant and white bean soup, which had a skin like a pachyderm and a slightly musky aroma. The name was entirely apposite, however, for a modest portion contained precisely one white bean. The computer may be a bean counter also. Mully had the Caesar salad. He thought it perfectly good.

The steak and kidney pudding which followed was a bit anaemic - no one, as we may have observed before, makes steak and kidney pudding like Fray Bentos - the sea bass, our companion thought, could have done with a few weeks longer on the fish farm.

Vegetables, well cooked, are served on the same plate, a wretched habit not least because cauliflower cheese and steak and kidney pud make uncomfortable bedfellows.

The staff, happily, were entirely human, smiled a lot, inquired periodically - press Button B? - if everything were satisfactory and then brought a little blackboard upon which four puddings were listed.

The menu had said that diners would be introduced to the puddings. Perhaps the caramel apple granny and the blackcurrant and apple cobbler were expected to speak for themselves. They were fine, anyway. With a pint of Bass apiece, the bill rose to £31.50.

It was Tuesday evening, and we were off to the football match next door. By 7.30pm the place was filling up nicely: poor no longer, the Church Mouse seems to be making a fortune.

TIME once again the following evening to guide our friends from the Cleveland real ale crew - led, as ever, by Mr Eric Smallwood - on a tour of the County palatine's rich delights.

As always, Eric carried a rucksack of the sort which most people use for trekking across the Andes but which appeared to contain little more than a cold bacon sandwich and a bit of paper with directions for the bus driver. (There is a nutritional reason why he believes a carefully timed cold bacon sandwich to be essential on these occasions, though it's impossible to remember what it is.)

We began at the Countryman in Bolam, a pub which in every respect appears always to be cared for. Off the A68 above West Auckland, its ales included Mordue's more-ish Workie Ticket. The buckshee quiche, size of a surgical boot, was utterly memorable.

Across thereafter to Heighington, where real ale sales at the George and Dragon have increased from 16 to more than 60 per cent in 11 months and Mr Smallwood was so taken by the Ridley's Mild - a rare bird hereabouts - that he vowed to return for lunch next day.

Finally to the County in Aycliffe Village, now owned by Roux scholarship winning chef Andrew Brown and visited last year by Tony Blair and Jacques Chirac. Though its name is made as a food pub, Andrew commendably keeps four hand pumps.

By closing time, Eric's shoulders appeared to be sagging. Since responsibility lies lightly upon him, it could only have been the rucksack.

THOUGH Cleveland may be something of a real ale desert, it's the Garden of Eden compared to Crook.

Crook is the keg capital of Europe, which explains Alastair Downie's excitement when he came upon cask John Smith's in the Travellers Rest of Wheatbottom. Alastair edits Weird Ale News, the monthly newsletter of CAMRA's Wear Valley sub-branch. The great news held the front page, warranted more space inside.

Just as he was off to the printer, however, word arrived that the Travellers journey into real ale was over. They'd been persuaded to sell keg Caffreys instead; the desert is irrigated no longer.

ENCOUNTERED in the Railway Tavern in Northgate, Darlington - pristine London Pride, £1.60 - Alastair also asks us to mention the presentation on November 15 of CAMRA's North-East pub of the year award to the Ship Inn at Middlestone Village, near Spennymoor. It's also the start of the Ship's four day beer festival. Details from Alastair on 07751 644990.

...and finally, the bairns wondered if we knew what's white, furry and smells of peppermint.

A Polo bear, of course.

Published: Tuesday, September 25, 2001